The Scarlet Pimpernel

 The Scarlet Pimpernel

were going through the gates; there was one laden with casks,
and driven by an old man, with a boy beside him. Grospi-
erre was a bit drunk, but he thought himself very clever; he
looked into the casks—most of them, at least—and saw they
were empty, and let the cart go through.’
A murmur of wrath and contempt went round the group
of ill-clad wretches, who crowded round Citoyen Bibot.
‘Half an hour later,’ continued the sergeant, ‘up comes a
captain of the guard with a squad of some dozen soldiers
with him. ‘Has a car gone through?’ he asks of Grospierre,
breathlessly. ‘Yes,’ says Grospierre, ‘not half an hour ago.’
‘And you have let them escape,’ shouts the captain furiously.
‘You’ll go to the guillotine for this, citoyen sergeant! that
cart held concealed the CI-DEVANT Duc de Chalis and all
his family!’ ‘What!’ thunders Grospierre, aghast. ‘Aye! and
the driver was none other than that cursed Englishman, the
Scarlet Pimpernel.’’
A howl of execration greeted this tale. Citoyen Grospi-
erre had paid for his blunder on the guillotine, but what a
fool! oh! what a fool!
Bibot was laughing so much at his own tale that it was
some time before he could continue.
‘‘After them, my men,’ shouts the captain,’ he said after a
while, ‘‘remember the reward; after them, they cannot have
gone far!’ And with that he rushes through the gate fol-
lowed by his dozen soldiers.’
‘But it was too late!’ shouted the crowd, excitedly.
‘They never got them!’
‘Curse that Grospierre for his folly!’